Spanish Mounted Crossbowman and Lancer by Villegas, Clonard Album, 1861

This original hand colored lithograph comes from the Album de la Caballería Española, the illustrated history of the Spanish cavalry published in Madrid in 1861. It shows two armored horsemen of the late Middle Ages in action: a mounted crossbowman taking aim and a light horseman charging with his lance.

On the left, the crossbowman sits a dappled gray horse at a walk, the crossbow raised to his shoulder and a quiver of bolts on his back. He wears an open steel helmet, a mail and plate harness over a red skirt and steel legs, and his horse is fitted with a red breast strap and crupper. On the right, his companion gallops a bay horse over a fallen log and a tangle of brushwood, his lance leveled in his right hand and a round shield held high on his left arm, his helmet pulled low over his face. A cloud of dust rises behind the horses.

The Album de la Caballería Española was compiled by Lieutenant General Serafín María de Sotto, Count of Clonard, and published in Madrid in 1861. Its plates follow the Spanish cavalry from its earliest days to the reign of Isabel II, showing the arms, armor, dress and horse furniture of each period.

The plate carries the stone signature Villegas at the lower left of the image, the line "Villegas dibujó y litografió" beneath it, and the printer's line "Lit. Militar S. Bernardino 7. Madrid" at the lower right. The image sits within a double ruled border with rounded corners. The figures are printed on a cream tint and colored by hand, the red of the saddle cloths and the steel gray of the armor giving the sheet its strength.

Medieval subjects are among the most dramatic plates in the Clonard album, and they are much scarcer on the market than the French and German costume prints of the period. This one would hang well in a study or library.

This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed.